Colorado Springs, arguably one of the most beautiful cities in the nation, received national exposure Monday night on ABC News.
Sadly, the report was less than flattering.
Colorado Springs was featured in a story about “extreme” budget cuts.
The city is “taking budget cutting to a whole new level,” World News anchor Diane Sawyer said.
The police helicopters are for sale, she explained.
Evening and weekend bus service is being eliminated, she said.
A third of the city’s streetlights are being turned off, she reported.
“No more trash cans in city parks, and residents are being asked to bring their own lawnmowers if they want the lawns trimmed in the park,” Sawyer said.
“But there may not be much to trim,” she added. “Water is being cut off to the parks, too.”
City spokeswoman Sue Skiffington-Blumberg said she didn’t think the report was embarrassing.
“Why should we be embarrassed about the state of our economy and the very difficult decisions that we’re having to make?” she asked.
“It would be disingenuous for us to pretend that we aren’t in a bad situation,” she added.
The report was accurate, Skiffington-Blumberg said.
“Everything they reported is a fact,” she said. “If they were trying to make us look bad for entertainment value, that’s one thing. But these things that they reported on were accurate. Does that make me happy? No. It makes me very sad, but it is true.”
But does the report reflect badly on the city, which received accolades as recently as October?
“I think it’s sad is what it is,” Skiffington-Blumberg said. “But I don’t think we’re the only community facing these kinds of things. There’s libraries being boarded up in other communities. That can’t be a proud moment for them.”
True, but they weren’t featured on national TV.
What I find SAD is that the collective WE are too CHEAP to pony up and pay fair market value for the services we all need. I supported needed increases but, the majority of those who bothered to vote did not. So, I will use the word CHEAP to describe the collective US. We deserve just what we have. And we deserve to have it pointed out.
Hey! But we have plenty of money available to keep USOC here, and apparently there may be yet another $1.9 million just sitting around collecting dust that council will be spent on buying the City Gas building… also for USOC!
Great piece for the EDC (not) to put in the launch packets for Site Consultants. No firm in their right mind is going to re-locate to Colorado Springs.
Way to go City Council – Nice Bad Press! – You’re on a roll -
Time to bring in some 5th graders – They would do better than the current council, city manager and city attorney.
Hey … we can eat scenery can’t we??!! What a joke … this place is going to the dogs faster than can be expected.
What’s ABC news?
“Hey! But we have plenty of money available to keep USOC here,”
We must keep in mind that due to legally binding contractual agreements, even though it came due at a REALLY bad time, the City had no choice but to honor them. What’s worse? Follow through with agreements that were put in place before the meltdown, or lose all the money invested in the venture and face legal actions that would cost us a lot of money, money that would be essentially wasted with no added value to any of us?
We are becoming the city Doug Bruce has always envisioned! A great place for lonely angry people.
retire7 says: “What I find SAD is that the collective WE are too CHEAP to pony up and pay fair market value for the services we all need.”
The thing is, we don’t ALL need those services.
Why Would small or big business start here,or relocate to here,unless its for the scenery,makes me wonder Why I moved here,well just for the scenerysomeone needs to get there ACT together
beepbeep says:
Great piece for the EDC (not) to put in the launch packets for Site Consultants. No firm in their right mind is going to re-locate to Colorado Springs.
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Sad but true.
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Way to go City Council – Nice Bad Press! – You’re on a roll -
Time to bring in some 5th graders – They would do better than the current council, city manager and city attorney.
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It’s the voters, not the Council. Council tried to raise money but the voters refused.
Ender, you’re partially right. The tax increase was voted down b/c it wasn’t specific enough. Just dumping a bunch of money in the general fund without specifically earmarking it just won’t fly in this town.
Whoops, hit enter before I was finished.
In closing, council certainly shares the blame in why the tax increase didn’t pass b/c of the poor wording of the proposal.
ender:
Sad to report – I disagree – When you have an afternoon off of work – go to a city council meeting – We got one coming up on Feb. 8 & 9th. Informal and Formal.
Bring your popcorn & soda – it’s a great show!
Watching & listening to the city council and then the reports and advice that they get from the City Manager, City Attorney, City Finance Officer.
We need to vote everyone of these council members off the council. They are re-active & passive. Not pro-active like we need.
BeepBeep wrote:
Great piece for the EDC (not) to put in the launch packets for Site Consultants. No firm in their right mind is going to re-locate to Colorado Springs.
Way to go City Council – Nice Bad Press! – You’re on a roll -
Time to bring in some 5th graders – They would do better than the current council, city manager and city attorney.
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Actually it was the people who voted for this, definitely not City Council’s fault the people did not want to vote for a tax raise so that the council did not have to cut so much.
It’s just sad looking at my last property tax bill. Somehow everyone around here think that 68 dollars on a 205k assesment for the City for a year is too much for everything they provide. Just terribly sad. I have no kids, but the D20 bond is over $950. Its just so sad we can’t at least keep the parks looking decent which I do use.
The people in this town are just Doug Bruce sheeple. Can’t think for themselves and don’t ever think beyond the now.
It really sucks that we are voting for less and less business to move to this town. It really sucks and is only going to get worse if we don’t pull our heads from where the sun don’t shine and start encouraging the business community again.
Doug Bruce and his minions have been cutting spending in this town since 1994. Ask yourself, are we really better off now than we were then?
Truly Sad
With all due respect, the city council punished the citizens by doing the budget cuts in:
- the helicopters
- bus transportation
- park & rec
- street lights
The budget (junk) is online – They have 7 receptionists (one on each floor) in the city adminstration bldg. 30+ city attornies, HR staff 30+ for 1300 employees.
Yikes! We have the inmates running the jail!
The single subject rule requires ballots to be itemized: one vote for a general fund increase, or 20 ballot items for 20 essential services. Doublewhomper thinks only 2 of them are essential, which cancels out beepbeep’s vote on housing authority (homeless rehab-relocation) funds, which cancels out another’s vote on swimming pools and summer youth programs, which cancels out pothole paving, etc.
notsofast – Agree
We need a transparent City Government!
It IS embarassing because no other cities are having to make such drastic cuts. Their leaders recognized sales tax decreases early and made adjustments throughout and were careful to not be over leveredged.
It IS embarassing, and the fact that they dont think so concerns me.
City spokeswoman Sue Skiffington-Blumberg said she didn’t think the report was embarrassing.
Of course, Sue Skiffington-Blumberg doesn’t feel the need to pay her pesky TAXES like the LITTLE PEOPLE either…
After all, SHE’S “SPECIAL.”
She’s an AMAZING EMBARRASSMENT that SHOULD HAVE BEEN LONG GONE LONG BEFORE NOW.
This news report is embarrassing, as are the responses of our city’s spokesperson.
I voted for the tax increase because I knew these kinds of things would be coming. People rejected the tax increase to punish the city government, and now, it seems, the city government is doing its best to punish the voters.
The council does need to make cuts, but many of the cuts it’s making seem punitive and short sighted. Removing trash cans from parks may save a few thousand a year, but is that making a meaningful impact on our budget shortfall? I doubt it, but it will certainly make a meaningful impact on our city’s cleanliness, one that will cost far more to clean up whenever we get around to funding the parks again.
Our parks are one of this community’s greatest assets. They can be enjoyed by anyone, whether playing ball, taking a walk, or just driving by and enjoying the view. Do we need them to survive? Well, no, but we could also survive in tents on Fountain Creek, rather than living in actual houses (as many folks sadly are).
Our goal should be to preserve our quality of life as best we can — and to make cuts that will not result in much larger expenses down the line, not to mention the damage these cuts will inevitably do to our ability to attract new jobs and new residents that could actually hasten that recovery.
Cuts are going to hurt no matter what, so let’s make cuts that will actually bring a sizable savings (like cutting city employees’ salaries, the largest expense in the budget, across the board). It won’t be fun, but it’s what many of their private sector neighbors have already endured. And, if our parks aren’t trashed, we will all at least all have an inexpensive place to rest and play while we work to find some solutions to our problems. The current cuts seem to be doing no more than hacking to pieces what’s most visible, with little benefit, and creating more problems.
Please, let’s use some common sense.
This is more bad news–which is no news to us locals. A city with a spirit of CREATE Community has more appropriately become DEFLATE Community. Pray for rain…wait, no…we won’t have a Stormwater Enterprise to fix the flood damage! At least we have our roadway engineers…wait, no…they’ve been laid off. Better yet, let’s ask all of our wonderful voters to VOLUNTEER to pave our streets, protect against flooding, police our neighborhoods, respond to our traffic accidents, maintain our parks, etc. Yet then we hear an outcry that the City must indeed share the pain equally with everyone else…but haven’t they already exceeded the pain threshold at this point. What exactly should be the bottom line?
Every time you hit a pot hole a vote takes its toll.
MY BAD.
I HAD “PENELOPE” IN MIND. GUILTY…
THESE HYPHENATED LAST NAMES OF CITY BUREAUCRATS START LOOKING ALIKE AFTER WHILE.
STILL, IF “SUE SKIFFINGINGTON-….” DOESN’T FIND THIS REPORT “EMBARRASSING, THEN SHE NEEDS TO BE OUTTA HERE TOO…
Rinkydinkville. And there are two reasons; city government is inept, residents are ultra cheapskates.
Phoenix will be laying off 12% of police and fire
355 cops, 144 firefighters
I don’t know what our percentage was but I think it was much less than 12%. I’d gladly trade our cuts (trash, lights, etc) for the REAL essential services.
Some local municipalities are eliminating the entire police force and reverting to sheriffs. Where was ABC on that?
I agree with a previous post that instead of making meaningful cuts, the government is trying to punish the voters with this action. The fat government workers should take meaningful cuts just like everyone in the private sector.
Voters stay united!
I would happily pitch in to clean up parks, carry and flashlight, and get my CWP in order to stick it t the man.
My out-of-state friends thought the report was great and would like to move here. They all wanted to know how to apply for a city job; since, at the CS level and low cost of living It’d be a 40% increase in pay.
(I sent them the database).
Reality check ….. more on Phoenix …..
Massive Layoffs Coming in NYC, Nevada, California, Colorado, Arizona, Everywhere
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2010/01/massive-layoffs-coming-in-nyc-nevada.html
“….Six of the city’s 15 library branches, five of its senior centers and numerous sports complexes and community centers would be shuttered. Funding for the arts and after-school programs would be slashed. And bus routes and light-rail hours would be reduced……”
What is an ‘ABC’? Oh, a dying news outlet.
It’s obvious that 1/2 the people who comment here are city employees
someone find out how overpaid Sue Skiffington Blomberg is, of course she will not mention the bloated compensation for these people who think they are above wage cuts and entitlements get
We have a city manager who walked away from her own mortgage obligations in California and now lives in the Broadmoor how jacked up is that? she is managing our city services and employees, hey let’s blame her incompetence on Doug Bruce!!
So, let me get this straight. The voters messed in their collective nest and now they are unhappy with the result. So they expect the city employees to fix it at their own expense?? I as a voter am ashamed at the pure arrogance of this.
I am not nor have I ever been an employee of this city. I am just a retired property owner and voter and i would never suggest such a thing. We voters need and deserve to swim in the mess we created and quit complaining and blaming the people who work for us. They live here and pay taxes here just like the rest of us and have to swim in our mess with us. I infact supported increases but realize that i am stuck with the majority now.
After giving the employee database a quick glance I noticed a large number of “middle managemet” types. Looks like we could do with fewer generals and more soldiers.
proamerica, you need to warn those friends that the city’s laid off 200 jobs and will not replace the 500 lost over tha last decade, so there are no city jobs available at any price. The remaining 600 will start leaving when the 10% cut is announced for 2011, and they will not be replaced either.
Welcome them to the same fix they have in California – handwriting’s on the wall!
Notsofast – This is the exact opposite of CA’s “solution”. CAs problems are due to overspending…COS is cutting government spending. A refreshing step in the right direction.
I recently received my property tax bill. $753 of the $950 bill is for D20. That amounts to 78%. I believe taxes should help pay for school, but 78 PERCENT?? Certainly not everyone living in D20 has children in school. Is everyone paying property tax in D20 giving 78% of the bill to the school system? Is there a similar situation in the neighboring school districts? If so, the city is getting less than one-quarter of the property tax assessments each year. No wonder the city relies so heavily on sales tax for revenue. Combine that with the fact that the city council’s request for additional tax revenue this last November was a total joke in both the way it was requested and the way it was justified. Like everyone else in the country, we need to reevaluate how we are spending money in our city.
This is embarrasing. Wake up taxpayers and pay for your fair share. I am willing.
mpinco- yeah, you want the sherrif’s to take over? Good luck on that one!
I don’t think it’s sad that we have cut our budget – I just think it’s sad where city council has chosen to make the cuts. But they are crazy like a fox without a doubt. Those who call them stupid and the like don’t know what they are talking about.
This council knows EXACTLY what it is doing. They make cuts in the areas most likely to be publicly seen and felt. That way the outcry grows, people get angry and the next tax increase passes to “save the parks, the pools, police service, etc.”
Now don’t get me wrong – all of those things are important and needed. I’m just still not convinced there weren’t other places to go find those budget cuts and keep those kinds of services in place – if at a reduced level or at increased user fee cost to the public who uses the services like pools.
I don’t believe people here are cheap – I just believe they (we) don’t trust city council to make the good, hard decisions that need to be made while still insuring basic city services are taken care of.
Once we have transparency and it’s evident that we’ve cut the fat and there is really nothing left to cut without cuttnig into services like they are now – then I believe you’ll see people in this community step up and pay the tab.
“Why should we be embarrassed about the state of our economy and the very difficult decisions that we’re having to make?”
I don’t buy it. You guys are WASTING what do you have. Case in point: Absolutely useless road-narrowing work and a median on Holland Park Blvd. How much did that cost taxpayers? $30,000? $50,000? You guys can’t afford to keep our street lights powered, but you can add a bunch of unnecessary brick and cement to a single street.
ever needed a cop? I have called several times and gotten no help,
they acted like they could care less about my issues. Tell proud cop wife we can do just fine with a 25% reduction in police force
Gee, all Sue can say is, sad, but true? Maybe the cuts that they are making aren’t the cuts that should have been made. Of course, the cuts that they have made tend to affect the city residents the most. Don’t think about making cuts within the city, such as travel, purchase of vehicles, unnecessary training, fewer employees, etc.
Just make the cuts that affect the public so that you can teach them a lesson on how they voted no on increased property taxes will hurt them. Don’t think long term about having to replace sod in the parks, don’t think about trash in the parks, don’t think about the citizens that have to rely on public transit to get to work, don’t think about increased crime when you turn off the streetlights. Think short term on how you can save a nickel here and a nickel there.
Too bad the city couldn’t think long term and have some money set aside for when the economy was weak. All the city is effective at is tax and SPEND! Even when they don’t have the money for such things as the USOC blackmailing fiasco!
We may have the USOC, but look at the state of the city? Do tourists, much less business want to come here?
retired7 said:
“So, let me get this straight. The voters messed in their collective nest and now they are unhappy with the result. So they expect the city employees to fix it at their own expense?? I as a voter am ashamed at the pure arrogance of this. ”
Gee, retired7, I guess you must have a pretty comfy retirement that you can continue to support tax increase after tax increase. I don’t have that luxury, and I am sure that I speak for many others.
When you see how the city department heads proposes and approves projects that are not needed and/or a high priority such as:
1) turn Tejon street to north/south traffic
2) install electronic card parking meters downtown
3) install numerous roundabouts throughout the city to “calm traffic.” Check out the gorgeous ones on Mesa and in the Broadmoor!!
4) expand the city parking garage at Nevada and Colorado
I am not opposed to paying taxes. I AM opposed to the squandering of those taxes by arrogant and short sighted city management and city council.
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[...] years ago, Colorado Springs was thrust into the media spotlight when city officials decided turned off nearly 8,000 streetlights, among other drastic cost-cutting [...]